The nature of APIs In a digital economy with open business ecosystems, channel experiences and backend systems evolve at different speeds. Nevertheless, an engaging experience must combine the two. Being able to see health statistics is useful, for example, but being able to do something with those statistics in the context of your personal health is the differentiator. Thus, truly engaging apps must leverage data and functions across backend systems of record as well as smart systems of insight.

Process mapping is often the first step in business process improvement. It is a necessary activity that provides a baseline from which improvements can be measured and is the key to identifying and localizing opportunities for improvement. Therefore it is important that facilitators capture the right information to help steer process improvement initiatives in the right direction.

Facilitators must possess the ability to lead (steer the direction of meetings), manage people (deal with conflicts and diversions), and persuade participants to open up and share the knowledge they possess to have successful mapping sessions. This can be challenging when dealing with large groups and complicated processes. Following the guidelines outlined in this article can help to ensure that you have a successful process mapping session.

Cora was new at her position and her company. She had been brought in to manage a project that was not performing well. The project was well behind its deadlines and so over budget it amazed Cora that the company still wanted to go ahead with it. Knowing that there would be a lot of pressure on Cora and her team to salvage the project, Cora set her mind to getting to know as much as possible about the project from day one.

It was obvious to Cora that the team had tried many solutions and strategies and all of them failed. The team knew the goal but not the way to achieve it. So for the first days she listened. She went to see each and every one of her team members to introduce herself, get to know them a little bit, and get their take on what was happening with the project.

Responsive web design is fast becoming a mantra in the digital media design. The idea is to create compelling experiences that adeptly respond to how a person interacts with digital media. It doesn’t matter what device I use to browse an electronic commerce website; the form and content should make it easy for me to find what I’m looking for. And maybe buy more of their products, more often.

I make the same case for responsive business architecture. As a decision-maker, I need all the tools, techniques, and information I can get to make the most-informed decisions on a daily basis. Decision making is both an art and science. I can turn to a business architect and listen to the options available to me. And I can ask my lawyer, accountant, fellow Board members, or any subject matter expert for their opinions. In the end, I synthesize data and information to come up with the best possible decision at that time.

Do you wonder why some BPM efforts seem to proceed more smoothly? Stakeholders have provided clear directions regarding improvements. The project manager has the pulse of all the activities happening on the project. The process owners and technical experts are collaborating and making changes to processes that will enable the organization to improve its operations substantially.

No this isn’t someone’s dream, and it does happen, albeit rarely!

Project members’ poor communication is one of the reasons business process efforts aren’t more successful. In fact, failure is virtually ensured if just one of these groups doesn’t communicate clearly.

Good communicators know before they open their mouths what they want to convey. They are clear about the message they want to communicate. Accomplished communicators are specific and use words and language that resonates with their listeners.

Organizational decisions are not as effective because we have not been able to explicitly connect organizational Knowledge to decisions. Formal decision modeling helps deploy existing knowledge and highlights knowledge gaps that need to be filled.

Knowledge is diffused across the organization

How do we know if we are making good decisions? When we are confident that we have used all available knowledge in making that decision.

How can we tell if our knowledge is good or bad? There is no clear measure of knowledge but its value is understood and appreciated. We know that there is a lot of effort and investment in increasing organizational knowledge. Procedure Manuals, Training Programs, Collaboration Sites, Intranets, Portals, Share point and others are all geared towards making organizations better through pooling and managing the communal knowledge.

“I think many [agencies] would greatly benefit from a top-to-bottom efficiency analysis . . . done by people who understand government. The results of such an analysis . . . can provide a menu of choices for . . . officials as they work through the real nitty-gritty issues of efficiency in government.” – John R. Bartle, dean of the College of Public Affairs & Community Service at the University of Nebraska at Omaha

Remember when you had to purchase your music via cd’s, records, or cassettes at brick and mortar record stores? Prior to the iPod’s arrival, there was always a delay between the intent to purchase the songs we wanted and the time when we could actually enjoy them. The delay was either the travel time to and from a store to buy the album or the time waiting for an order placed online to arrive from the post office. There definitely wasn’t instant gratification in the process. The purchasing channels were rigid – requiring us to buy in increments of albums instead of choosing the exact songs we wanted. But there wasn’t an outcry from consumers. We learned to live with the shortcomings of the process. But then came revolutionary change.

My last posting (“Transitioning to a World of Decisions”) began presenting observations of decision modeling, implementation and management as they have moved from theory to practice. These observations have been made from both the Business and IT sides of the Enterprise. Although the sample size is still relatively small, some definite trends are beginning to take shape. While the previous article focused primarily on testing, I also alluded to some difficulties arising from a strict reliance on using decision tables for ALL rules. I have observed this on several projects.